When United States Pdwellnt Donald Trump proclaimd his deferedst tariffs on steel and aluminium this week, he insisted there would be “no exemptions, no exceptions”.
Washington’s sealst allies in the Asia-Pacific are hoping that they will be able to alter the mercurial US pdwellnt’s mind.
Japan, South Korea and Australia, US treaty allies with send out-reliant economies, have all checked that they are seeking exemptions from Trump’s 25 percent tariffs on steel and aluminium.
Trump has pledged to chase up on the meacertains aacquirest presented steel and aluminium with wideer reciprocal tariffs, which could potentipartner cover a far wider range of excellents, on countries that impose levies on US send outs as soon as Thursday.
“We will apshow vital meacertains, including lobbying the United States for an exemption, while seally watching any possible impact on the Japanese economy,” Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, who met Trump in Washington last week, tgreater parliament on Wednesday.
Tokyo’s efforts to sway Trump are probable to comprise promisements to incrmitigate US presents.
The US trade deficit with Japan stood at about $70bn last year, mostly as a result of send outs by Japanese autooriginaters such as Toyota, Honda and Nissan.
Tokyo is also probable to highweightless its presentance as an partner in faceing China in the region and “its technical acquire, which is hopelessly needed by the US to apshow a direct in new strategic industries”, said Shigeto Nagai, the Asia head of Oxford Economics.
“Japan enhappinesss a huge trade surplus with the US for machineries, which donates incentive to the US to impose tariffs,” Nagai tgreater Al Jazeera.
“At the same time, the technoreasonable acquire of Japanese machineries such as semidirector providement and materials will originate it difficult to speedyly discover replaces.”
After their talks at the White Hoemploy on Friday, Trump and Ishiba freed a fuset statement acunderstandledging the Reaccessiblean’s agfinisha of raiseing domestic industry, including a pledge to reinforce energy security by “unleashing the United States’ affordable and depfinishable energy and organic resources”.
At the same time, Ishiba astonished upon Trump that Japan has been the hugest foreign allotor in the US for the past five years running and proclaimd arranges for $1 trillion in further allotments, including in synthetic inalertigence.
“My sense is that this [tariff exemptions] remains negotiable,” Ryota Abe, an economist at Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC), tgreater Al Jazeera.
“The adverse impacts on the US economy would not be minuscule should the relationship between the two gravely be injured. And this would not be the best choice even for the US.”
Although the contours of his second administration’s policy priorities are still unfgreatering, Trump has apshown his reputation for being fond of a deal with him from his first term.
Despite insisting that his tariffs would apply to all countries, Trump almost promptly left the door uncover to an exception for Australia, saying he would donate “fantastic ponderation” to an exemption.
“We have a surplus with Australia, one of the restricted,” Trump said.
Trump’s greater guidelor for trade and manufacturing, Peter Navarro, poured freezing water on those hopes the folloprosperg day, claiming that Australia was “finishing” the US aluminium labelet.
Australia’s aluminium send outs sencouraged after Trump first go ined office in 2016, peaking at about 269,000 tonnes in 2019.
Exports have varyd ponderably since then, coming in at 83,000 tonnes in 2024, down from 210,000 the previous year.
“Overall, the second Trump administration is acting both more cruelly and turbulentpartner than the first, so allies enjoy Japan – and Australia, and NATO/EU [European Union] allies – will persist to face a highly volatile and difficult discreet situation, which will need excessively dextrous directership,” Craig Mark, an adjunct lecturer in economics at Hosei University in Tokyo, tgreater Al Jazeera.
During his first term, Trump did not adchoose a unicreate approach to granting reprieves to frifinishly countries and allies.
In 2018, his administration exempted Australia from steel and aluminium tariffs and granted South Korea a duty-free steel quota of up to 2.63 million tonnes.
But his administration did not extfinish such relief to Japan.
The administration of createer US Pdwellnt Joe Biden mitigated the tariffs on Japanese steel in 2022, consenting to permit 1.25 million metric tonnes of steel to go in the US each year duty-free while upretaining tariffs on aluminium in place.
“The experience of the first Trump administration shows how Japan could discover itself the concentrate of US tariffs yet aacquire, despite all its discreet efforts,” said Mark, the Hosei University professor, pointing out that createer Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe went to “fantastic lengths to originate a seal personal relationship with Trump”.
While Trump has a “much more expansive see of his rrehire”, appraised with his first term, and sees tariffs as a “repartner precious tool that can be employd to mend a myriad of problems”, the overriding feature of his administration is uncertainty, said Deborah Elms, head of trade policy at the Hinwealthy Foundation in Singapore.
Elms said she was not certain Trump himself would be able to provide answers about his policy honestion or goals, “or if he did so, that his answers now would be the same as what he might say in another hour or day or week”.
“As he’s the one driving trade policy – for the moment, at least – this informage of clarity matters,” Elms tgreater Al Jazeera.
