Trump signs new global tariffs with delayed start

President Donald Trump on Thursday night signed an executive order imposing new tariff rates on countries worldwide. The order codified the newly agreed-upon tariffs on the European Union and raised most tariffs across the board. Syria, Laos, Myanmar, and Switzerland face the highest import tariffs at roughly 40%. Most countries’ goods will be taxed at 15% to 30%.

But the changes won’t take effect until Aug. 7, according to the order. The tariff hike also doesn’t apply to goods in transit or pulled from warehouses for shipping by that date, as long as the goods arrive by Oct. 5.

The order also says that an individual provision of the document, or an application of the order to an individual nation, may be changed later without invalidating the rest of the order. That section gives countries the chance to continue negotiations to change their tariff rate. The order also includes higher penalties for evading tariffs by shipping goods to an intermediate location before their final destination.

Trump on Thursday also hiked tariffs on Canada to 35%, up 10 points from the previous 25%, in a separate order related to drug trafficking. Canada failed to sufficiently curb the flow of drugs across its border into the United States, according to the order. However, that change only applies to goods not covered by the USMCA trade agreement.

Which countries made last-minute deals before the tariff hike? Cambodia, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand all recently struck deals to lower Trump’s proposed tariffs ahead of the deadline. Malaysia avoided a 25% tariff after its prime minister called Trump to negotiate on Thursday, according to The Straits Times, a Singapore-based, English-language newspaper. The tariff on Malaysian imports was set at 19%, according to the new order.

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet on Thursday said his country’s goods would also be taxed at 19%, which he called an excellent outcome. The previous rate had been 36%, according to the Khmer Times, an English-language paper in Cambodia. Trump imposed 20% and 19% tariffs on Vietnam and Indonesia, respectively.

Dig deeper: Read my report on Trump’s plan to raise tariff rates on India to 25%.