Still loving tariffs. The Trump administration announced it is imposing tariffs of 10% to 12.5% on imports from 60 countries that failed to enforce bans on goods produced with forced labor.
The decision is part of Mr. Trump’s effort to backfill a blanket 10% tariff that has expired after Congress opted not to renew it.
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said decades of trying to appeal to countries on moral grounds have not eradicated forced labor.
“The United States has had a forced labor import ban for nearly a century and rigorously enforces it. It’s well past time for our trading partners to do the same,” Mr. Greer said. “Today’s action will begin to correct what is both a human rights abuse and a distortive trade practice to improve the welfare of workers everywhere.”
Mr. Trump will keep tariffs at the center of his economic policy despite setbacks, Mr. Greer told Congress.
Mr. Greer said the specific authorities that Mr. Trump is using to impose tariffs “have changed, but the trade strategy has not.” He said the agenda will “support the reindustrialization of our economy, protect American workers and increase their wages and shrink our trade deficit.”
His testimony came five months after the Supreme Court struck down the White House’s ability to raise or decrease tariffs on individual nations under a 1977 economic-powers law.
Mr. Trump issued a 10% blanket global tariff on all imports in the wake of the court’s ruling. Those tariffs are valid for 150 days and are set to expire. Congress has not taken steps to extend them.
The administration recently announced 25% tariffs on most Brazilian goods and 50% levies on a wide range of Canadian products, citing unfair trade practices that hurt U.S. workers.
A U.S. civil nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia will be conditioned on the Saudis normalizing relations with Israel as part of his Abraham Accords, Mr. Trump said.
The condition is key because Saudi-Israeli normalization is a major goal for Mr. Trump but a thorny issue for the kingdom, which sees Israeli treatment of Palestinians as a major problem and impediment to better relations. The Abraham Accords normalized relations between Muslim-majority and Arab countries and Israel during Mr. Trump’s first term, but getting the Saudis to enlist is a key goal for the administration.
Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen will face the full force of the U.S. military if they carry out their threat to enforce a blockade in the Red Sea, Mr. Trump warned.
The Houthis occupy much of Yemen’s southwestern territory and maintain effective control over the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, a choke point in the southern part of the Red Sea.
U.S. attacks on Houthi strongholds in Yemen would mark a major expansion of the Iran war.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is pausing more than $1 billion in federal Medicaid payments to California and Minnesota because of suspected fraud and noncompliance, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced.
If California Gov. Gavin Newsom or Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, both Democrats, want the funding released, “all they have to do is provide basic documentation showing that these services are legitimate and not fraudulent, and that’s common sense,” he said.
CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz said withholding $1 billion is a “very conservative approach.”
Mr. Newsom’s office said Tuesday’s announcement is “the same recycled political stunt we’ve seen before” and that California is being targeted for political reasons. The governor is seen as a likely 2028 presidential contender.
Mr. Walz said the move is not about fraud but about “cutting your healthcare so that Trump can afford the tax cuts he gave to billionaires.”
A massive Medicaid fraud scheme by Somali-run daycare centers in Minnesota was exposed late last year.
