President Donald Trump’s new tariffs go into effect

Trump's higher import tax rates on dozens of countries and territories took hold at midnight

Washington: President Donald Trump’s sweeping new tariffs went into full effect just after midnight on Wednesday.

When Trump announced the latest round of tariffs on April 2, he declared that the US would now tax nearly all of America’s trading partners at a minimum of 10% — and impose steeper rates for countries that he says run trade surpluses with the US. The 10% baseline already went into effect on Saturday. Trump’s higher import tax rates on dozens of countries and territories took hold at midnight.

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The steeper levies run as high as 50% — with that biggest rate landing on small economies that trade little with the US, including the African kingdom of Lesotho. Some other rates include a tax of 47% on imports from Madagascar, 46% on Vietnam, 32% on Taiwan, 25% on South Korea, 24% on Japan and 20% on the European Union.

Some of these new tariffs build on previous trade measures. Trump last week announced a tariff of 34% on China, for example, which would come on top of 20% levies he imposed on the country earlier this year. Trump has since threatened to add an another 50% levy on Chinese goods in response to Beijing’s recently promised retaliation. That would bring the combined total to 104% against China.