"Many governments reacted to Trump's tariff package"

Transcript of Karina Batthyány's column
in InfoCLACSO – April 9, 2025

On April 2nd, US President Donald Trump pompously proclaimed what he himself called "Liberation Day," launching a tariff package that encompasses almost the entire planet. This provoked bewilderment and fears that quickly translated into a major global crisis with unpredictable consequences, introducing a scenario that redefines a new world economic order and, at its core, denotes a new stage in the crisis of the capitalist system under US hegemony.

In this context, analysts believe that our Latin American and Caribbean region got off relatively lightly, suffering (with exceptions like Venezuela and Nicaragua) “only” a 10% tariff increase, without distinction between countries with governments aligned with or critical of the White House. While Mexico is not affected by the new tariffs because it is one of the United States' partners in the North American Free Trade Agreement, the White House's constant threat of tariffs remains, intended to incite Mexico to combat what Washington calls illegal immigration and fentanyl trafficking: a 25% tariff on products not covered by the agreement, and additional 25% tariffs on steel, aluminum, and automobiles.

For instance, the shockwave hit Europe and Asia even harder, affecting, for example, an allied country like Israel with a 17% tariff increase, higher than the 15% imposed on Venezuela. Other examples of the resounding blow dealt to governments friendly to the White House include tariffs of 26% on India, 20% on the European Union, 24% on Japan, 25% on South Korea, and 32% on Taiwan—almost the same as the 34% on China, although in the latter case it is in addition to the 20% already being applied under the pretext of the fentanyl “invasion” of the United States.

The global impact was immediate. All of this restricts or increases the cost of access to the US market for many imported products and causes a drop in commodity prices affecting our region, in addition to the already palpable turbulence in financial markets worldwide, unprecedented losses of equity for mega-monopolies like Apple, Nvidia, Amazon, and Meta, with the resulting global recession, increased poverty and inequality, business closures, and rising unemployment. All of this is accompanied by an unrestrained arms race among the major capitalist countries.

Such ultra-protectionist policies undoubtedly impact the American people themselves, leading to recession and higher inflation, increased poverty and inequality, and compounding the initial dismantling of the state undertaken by the Donald Trump-Elon Musk administration in areas such as healthcare and public education, among others. The response was evident last weekend with over 1.200 massive demonstrations across all 50 states in defense of democracy and against the White House's policies.

In this new scenario, many governments reacted immediately. China imposed tariffs of 34% on American products, while a weakened Europe wavered between retaliating or continuing to negotiate with the Trump administration.

In our region, Colombian President Gustavo Petro emphasized the need to reduce dependence on external economies and seize the opportunity to strengthen trade ties among the region's countries, as well as explore other international markets. Meanwhile, his Brazilian counterpart, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, criticized Trump's extreme protectionism, stating that his country's response would be based on the so-called "law of economic reciprocity," and that he would take all appropriate measures to defend its companies and workers, in addition to upholding multilateralism and free trade.

What Gustavo Petro proposed from Colombia—deepening regional agreements—is also emerging in other parts of the world, as seen in the recent meeting between China, Japan, and South Korea to intensify intraregional trade over the next five years. This is no small feat, given that East Asia represents 20% of the world's population, 24% of the global economy, and 19% of global merchandise trade.

Today, Wednesday the 9th, the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) is meeting again in Honduras for its IX Summit of Presidents, a crucial forum not only for advancing a joint response to the new tariffs, but also for discussing the deportations of migrants from the United States and uniting against Trump's threats to reclaim the Panama Canal. I understand you will be discussing this important topic with one of the interviewees on this program, Julio Gambina.

Ultimately, what is being discussed more than ever is the crisis of neoliberal globalization, the crisis of capitalism itself, which is expelling ever-increasing masses of inhabitants from the system of this planet shaken by trade wars, armed conflicts, and also by the mistreatment of nature and the indifference of the powerful towards climate change, which has ceased to be a threat and is a reality that affects us daily on all five continents.

At the same time, these dizzying changes open new opportunities for peoples called upon to build viable, unified, and solidarity-based alternatives. Let us recognize that it is more than timely that our 10th Latin American and Caribbean Conference of Social Sciences in Bogotá, Colombia, will convene in exactly two months. It will undoubtedly be a forum for debate and the generation of proposals regarding these and other problems facing humanity, and a moment to reaffirm the role of the social sciences and humanities in daily life and in shaping the future during these times of profound and rapid change, which, we advocate, will be defined in a progressive, democratic, and inclusive way.

– How important it is to put into play the themes expressed within the framework of a very complex situation at the international level related to the new world economic order, which seems to group geopolitical logics related to China, South Korea and Japan and which have an impact on Latin America and the Caribbean.

– There is an attempt at global control that compels us to deepen our reflection on this new world economic order, the inevitable crisis of the capitalist system, and the United States' attempt at hegemonic recovery. All of these issues will be addressed at our upcoming #CLACSO2025 Conference and will be analyzed in the search for alternatives of, by, and for Latin America, promoted by CLACSO.

---

---