Business & Economics

Trump Scraps Turnberry Accord, Slaps 25% Tariff on EU Autos

On 1 May 2026 President Trump voided last year’s U.S.–EU Turnberry trade deal and said U.S. tariffs on European cars and trucks will jump from 15 % to 25 % next week unless production is moved stateside.

By Underlines TeamMay 3, 2026

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25 % duty replaces the 15 % ceiling negotiated in July 2025 and is slated to take effect the week of 4–8 May 2026.
EU-branded vehicles assembled inside the United States are exempt from the increase, per Trump’s Truth Social post.
The move follows a January 2026 Supreme Court ruling that struck down Trump’s earlier emergency tariff authority, pushing the White House to invoke Section 232 instead.

Trade tantrums are hardly new: Smoot-Hawley (1930) and Nixon’s 10 % import surcharge (Aug 1971) likewise used sudden tariffs to coerce partners, sowing retaliation and systemic strain. Trump’s latest hike continues the post-2018 trend of weaponising Section 232 and social-media diplomacy, underscoring the erosion of the rules-based order that the GATT (1947) and WTO (1995) tried to cement. By conditioning relief on local assembly, Washington is blending old-school protectionism with modern industrial policy, mirroring China’s JV mandates of the 1990s and the EU’s own carbon border tax. If such headline-driven, personality-centric tariffs become the norm, the century-long march toward lower barriers and predictable global supply chains could splinter into regional blocs, dampening growth and making future reversals—like the Tokyo or Uruguay Round gains—far harder to recreate.

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