Key Points
- President Trump’s threats to impose 50% tariffs on European Union products are another example of what has become clear during the trade war, according to trade and logistics experts: not all countries are giving in to his demands.
- European imports into the United States are essential to manufacturing and may conflict with the administration’s overall economic objective of enabling industrial reindustrialization.
- “Imposing significant tariffs on European imports would have the opposite effect, increasing the cost of producing American products,” said Andy Abbott, CEO of Atlantic Container Line.
President Trump’s threats to impose social media tariffs on Apple and the European Union reflect a worrying problem for markets and the economy, according to trade and logistics experts: the negotiation process is not going Trump’s way.
“Trump isn’t wrong that the EU has been less open than other countries, but the EU also has good reason to be reluctant to engage in this type of practice and has therefore found itself in a bind,” said Josh Teitelbaum, senior counsel at Akin. “Trump’s frustration reflects this underlying dynamic,” he added.
Akin said Apple, which Trump threatened Friday with 25% tariffs on any iPhone not made in the United States, faces a difficult situation because the Trump administration’s broader investigation into national security threats related to key technologies, semiconductor imports, and related products could bring iPhones under its purview. “He has a mechanism to carry out that threat,” Akin added.
But with Europe, the tariffs threaten to further damage a key trading relationship that had shown signs of recovery. Ocean freight bookings tracked by Sonar show that after a decline in bookings from the EU to the United States, ocean freight bookings have steadily recovered. There are concerns that this new threat could slow shipping orders again.
Andy Abbott, CEO of Atlantic Container Line, a shipping company specializing in trade between Europe and the United States, said this has significant implications for core U.S. manufacturing operations. Unlike Asia, which is a major supplier of consumer goods to the United States, Europe is primarily a source of industrial products that help U.S. manufacturers produce.
“Europe was stable and steady,” Abbott said. He added, “Imposing heavy tariffs on European imports will have the opposite effect, increasing the cost of producing American products.”
In discussions with the Trump administration, manufacturers have emphasized that any tariffs must take into account the cost of operating and expanding operations in the United States, and that the administration’s policy could conflict with the goal of reshoring production. Furthermore, U.S. exporters will suffer from the decline in trade. Abbott explained that container freight rates to Europe are only a third of those for U.S. import containers, so a decline in European imports would increase the price of U.S. exports, making U.S. products more expensive abroad.
“The EU is an important trading partner, and a 50% tariff would likely cause economic damage, and the EU could retaliate, further exacerbating the economic damage,” said Timothy Brightbill, partner at Wiley and co-chair of the International Trade practice. “This is a dangerous situation,” he added.
According to Dan Anthony, president of Trade Partnership Worldwide, the impact will vary from state to state in the United States.
U.S. trade with the European Union in 2024
EU share of total imports/exports by state
“There is no doubt that a 50% tariff would represent a massive and costly tax increase,” Anthony wrote in a LinkedIn post.
According to his organization’s data, state tariffs last year ranged from 0.23% (Indiana) to 2.36% (New Jersey), depending on the type of imported product.
“Implementing a 50% tariff effectively increases the rate by 20 to 200 times, depending on the state,” he said.
Change in executive tariffs paid by U.S. states
Nearly every state saw a triple-digit percent increase between March 2024 and March 2025.
Brightbill added that the EU faces a significant number of trade barriers, and these trade negotiations could provide an opportunity for agricultural and digital trade.
“There are many long-standing trade issues with the EU, going back years and years, and I think that’s why the administration wants the EU to come to the table,” Brightbill said. But he added that this doesn’t guarantee the European Union will respond in the way Trump wants. “There are many countries and different views on whether to negotiate in the first place, so it will be very difficult to reach a consensus,” he said.