Trump Offers Tariff Relief to Automakers

President Donald Trump signed executive orders on Tuesday to relax some of his 25% tariffs on automobiles and auto parts, a significant reversal as the import taxes threatened to hurt domestic manufacturers.

- Associated Press

WASHINGTON:

Automakers and independent analyses have indicated that the tariffs could raise prices, reduce sales and make US production less competitive worldwide.

Trump portrayed the changes as a bridge toward automakers moving more production into the US. "We just wanted to help them during this little transition, short term," Trump told reporters. "We didn't want to penalize them."

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who spoke earlier at a White House briefing on Tuesday, said the goal was to enable automakers to create more domestic manufacturing jobs.

"President Trump has had meetings with both domestic and foreign auto producers, and he's committed to bringing back auto production to the US," Bessent said.

"So, we want to give the automakers a path to do that, quickly, efficiently and create as many jobs as possible."

Trump signed one order on Tuesday that amended his previous 25% auto tariffs, making it easier for vehicles that are assembled in the US with foreign parts to not face prohibitively high import taxes.