BRUSSELS — The European Union is pushing Washington to clarify how the United States will proceed after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down President Donald Trump’s global tariffs, the EU executive said on Sunday.
“The European Commission requests full clarity on the steps the United States intends to take following the recent Supreme Court ruling on the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA),” the Commission said in a strongly worded statement issued after Trump announced Saturday he wants to impose a new global tariff rate of 15 percent.
“The current situation is not conducive to delivering ‘fair, balanced, and mutually beneficial’ transatlantic trade and investment,” the Commission said.
EU Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič spoke with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on Saturday, as the EU grapples with the uncertainty of whether its trade agreement struck in Scotland last summer still applies in light of Trump’s latest tariff threats.
The quickly evolving situation pushed a senior EU trade lawmaker to urge the European Parliament to postpone a vote on legislation implementing the EU’s side of its transatlantic trade deal.
Trump’s imposition of a 15 percent global tariff following Friday’s high court defeat is “a clear breach of the deal we had agreed,” Bernd Lange, chair of the European Parliament’s trade committee, told POLITICO on Sunday. “I will therefore propose that we suspend ratification of the agreement for the time being,” he said.
