After the US Supreme Court struck down Donald Trump's emergency tariffs, the White House has turned to another trade law linked to alleged human rights abuses. DW explains the new tariffs and the debate surrounding them.
The Trump administration on Thursday announced new tariffs on 60 economies, including the European Union, citing their handling of imported goods made with forced labor. In a statement, the United States Trade Representative (USTR) said it had investigated major trading partners and found that they failed to impose and effectively enforce a prohibition on the importation of goods made through modern slavery.
The tariffs cover more than 99% of US imports and replace a temporary 10% global tariff that was due to expire. A 10% tariff will apply to countries like Argentina, India, Pakistan and the UK that have adopted or committed to forced-labor import restrictions. The EU, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea and Switzerland will face tariffs of either 10% or 12.5%, depending on the product.
Goods from 38 other countries will be subject to the higher tariff of 12.5%, including China, most of the Middle East, much of Latin America, Australia, New Zealand and Russia. Exemptions include steel, aluminum, automobiles, civilian aircraft, rare earth minerals and goods covered by the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement. The new tariffs took effect just after midnight Eastern Standard Time on Friday, July 24.
The USTR noted that the US has banned imports made with forced labor for almost a century, adding that despite international consensus, "the prevalence of forced labor persists worldwide and has even escalated in recent years." Washington argues that foreign producers gain an unfair price advantage from the practice and that US workers cannot compete with forced-labor wages.
In reality, many critics and analysts see the move as a legal workaround for US President Donald Trump's broad tariff program, announced on "Liberation Day" April 2, 2025, which the US Supreme Court struck down in February. The new forced labor tariffs were introduced under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, a more established trade law that many analysts believe will be harder for courts to overturn.
The International Labour Organization (ILO) defines forced labor as work performed under the threat of penalty and without voluntary consent. While labor protections in the EU are comparatively strong, many imports still contain raw materials or components linked to forced labor elsewhere. Reacting to the new tariffs, the EU's top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, compared the bloc's labor laws to those of the United States.
Some analysts argued that the new tariffs don't keep to the spirit of the Supreme Court ruling and could be challenged. "These new tariffs would represent another case of presidential overreach," Alan Wolff, a former deputy director-general of the World Trade Organization (WTO), wrote in a blog post. "The world has become accustomed to higher US tariffs. There is no evidence that changing the US rationale for them will materially reduce forced labor in other countries," Wolff added.
Others said Trump was using forced labor concerns as a pretext, when the share of imports linked to forced labor from most advanced economies is negligible compared with China. Brad Setser, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote on X: "The tariffs use real concerns about China's labor practices not as the basis for tariffs against China, but for broad tariffs against most of the world."
Trade partners echoed those criticisms, with Brazil calling the tariffs "unjustified" and Australia labeling them "absurd." The administration is already using Section 301 for another investigation into excess manufacturing capacity in 16 major trading partners, including China and the EU. Trade experts expect it could lead to additional tariffs.
Source: www.dw.com