Trump Widens Tariff Assault After Court Defeat, Hitting Brazil and 60 Nations Over Forced Labour

The Trump administration has launched a multifront tariff offensive, proposing punitive duties on imports from more than 60 countries and singling out Brazil for 25 percent levies, in a bid to reassert trade aggression after a Supreme Court defeat stripped him of his emergency tariff authority. The cascade of proposed actions, announced through the US Trade Representative, also includes an investigation into Vietnam’s trade practices and a call for industry comment on managing commercial ties with China. The moves mark a return of trade tensions that had briefly receded while global attention focused on the escalating Middle East conflict.

Viewed from Washington, the levers are not solely about trade balances. The USTR is invoking Section 301 unfair trade practices investigations, a tool that allows the president to bypass the now‑defunct emergency powers. A separate proposed tariff of 10 to 12.5 percent on goods from dozens of countries — including European Union members — is grounded in allegations that trading partners have failed to curb forced labour in their supply chains. Critics, including human rights groups, warn that linking tariffs to forced labour risks doing little to fight modern slavery and could worsen conditions by driving production into even more opaque channels.

In Brasília, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s government is betting on dialogue to reverse the proposed 25 percent tariff on Brazilian products. After the USTR concluded two trade investigations against the country, Lula’s interlocutors told local media that there remains room for negotiation with the Trump administration. The Brazilian stance reflects a broader scramble by nations to shore up trade defences; Canada’s prime minister has visited Beijing seeking closer ties, and the EU has finally pushed forward a long‑stalled trade pact with South America’s Mercosur bloc while deepening commercial agreements with Southeast Asian nations.

Across the Atlantic, European policymakers are girding for what analysts in Italy describe as a “double trade war.” Brussels is simultaneously confronting China’s relentless export surplus — the subject of a confidential high‑level Commission meeting — and the prospect of renewed US tariffs. While the EU races to diversify its trade architecture, officials acknowledge that hopes of rebuilding an open global system are fading. Instead, a new imperative is taking hold: to stop China’s industrial juggernaut and secure strategic supply chains, from pharmaceuticals to critical minerals.

Long trade wars reshape alliances, and many capitals are manoeuvring. Yet the current wave of US actions, anchored partly in moral language around forced labour, is viewed in London and elsewhere as a shaky foundation. Analysts note that such measures are unlikely to resolve underlying imbalances and may fracture the global trading system further, pushing nations into narrower blocs. For all the talk of negotiation, the underlying dynamic — an American administration determined to wield tariffs as a primary instrument of statecraft — signals that the world is only in the opening phase of a protracted and unpredictable trade conflict.