Name: Trump's new tariffs: What they mean for consumers, markets and Europe | DW News
Uploaded: 2026-02-21T23:07:42.000Z
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Donald Trump wants to impose a 10% global tariff on America's trading partners after the Supreme Court ruled most of his previous levies have been illegal.

Adverbs of degree

Trump said the 63 ruling left him, quote, deeply disappointed and accused the Supreme Court of being, quote, swayed by foreign interests.

The US President vowed to deploy new methods to impose tariffs, including a sweeping new duty on all foreign trading partners.

Here's President Trump giving his reaction at a news conference.

Foreign countries that have been ripping us off for years are ecstatic.

They're so happy and they're dancing in the streets.

But they won't be dancing for long, that I can assure you.

But other alternatives will now be used to replace the ones that the court incorrectly rejected.

And joining me in the studio now is Stephen Beardsley from DW Business.

So the Supreme Court has decided that his tariffs were illegal, and

now he's responded with this 10% global tariff.

I think that's exactly the question that everyone's wondering.

You know, the Trump, the Trump administration has a number of levers that it can pull, and

it's made no bones about this in the past few months.

And it's said that if this ruling takes place, as it did take place, we have other mechanisms.

The question really is, what is their legality?

How would they actually fare before the courts?

And what often ends up happening with a lot of Trump legislation or a lot of his executive maneuvers, I should say, is that they do end up going before courts and then they're challenged at some point later.

This was a remarkable ruling and how he's responded so far with his 10% base tariffs, that's under a different section of law that actually requires it allows tariffs up to 15% base.

But then Congress has to act after 150 days.

That's problematic because Trump, for one, has said that he doesn't want Congress to have any part of his tariff regimes.

And also Congress probably doesn't want to decide on this as well.

They have midterm elections coming up, and this is a vulnerable point for them.

We know that affordability, the issue of cost in the US Is a major point for voters right now.

They don't want to have to go and defend raising taxes on consumer goods, and

that's ultimately what they would have to end up doing.

But again, this 10%, this mechanism that he's using right now, this, this law is actually probably as vulnerable than the one that's just been struck down.

So in many Ways, it seems like it would be a matter of time before that would be challenged as well.

And so there's a lot of uncertainty right now.

And I'm curious how international markets are responding so far.

Have there been specific countries that said anything?

I think everyone's reacting with caution right now because they do know that there are these levers.

We haven't seen any sort of bold statements, nor did we expect any, because they know that this is an administration that will pull out every mechanism in the book until it is tested in the courts.

That's the only reason there was pushback on this one, was because ultimately it was tested by an American company.

We should point out these were not foreigners who were paying these import levies.

They were American importers in most cases, and

American consumers who are paying for it at the end of the day, when they were passed on.

That's important to point out because this is an administration that keeps saying that foreigners are ultimately footing the bill for this.

But ultimately, at the end of the day, you know, markets are going to try and figure out what the vulnerable sections of certain businesses are.

They're going to be hit by this, because with this 10% broader tariff, that sort of changes the landscape a little bit.

There's some countries that are going to be advantaged because of that.

There's some that are going to be disadvantaged.

And so some companies may be exposed to new trade routes because of this, and

the markets are going to try and suss that out, but

you're not going to see any countries probably come out and start thundering about wanting their money back or something.

I understand it gets even messier because there is the question of reimbursements for those companies who've already paid the tariffs.

Unwinding, that feels like it would be a headache.

Right now, we know There are about 1800 companies that have litigation before US trade courts about tariffs that they feel like were unduly levied.

Now they're going to be clamoring for that money.

In many cases, the question is who has the record of how much was paid and who is ultimately due that money?

Do the companies themselves have records of every single import shipment that they brought in and the tariffs that were levied on that?

Another problem is that studies have shown that anywhere between 60 and 90% of the tariffs imposed, those were passed on to customers, but

That's a responsibility of the business itself because under the law, only the importers are obligated to receive the reimbursement, pass that on to customers.

Some dhl, for example, has already come out and said we have the technology to show exactly what customer has paid what we're going to reimburse them.

Will other customers be able to say that?

On top of that, there's one more issue is that some importers have sold the right to collect their reimbursements to third parties, which then may go before the courts and say we actually have the obligation to receive this.

And this is going to be a muddle because the Supreme Court said essentially you're owed this money.

But it didn't lay out how that process was supposed to happen.

Now, Stephen, very quickly, Trump premised the whole rollout of tariffs, saying that this would benefit America and American consumers.

There's no evidence that it's benefited anyone except for the government revenues themselves.

The government's made a lot of money on tariffs.

It's interesting because it's not the government, it's not Congress that decided that, but

it's the president who's basically created his own carve out for collecting a ton of money up to $200 billion that now the majority of that is due to back to businesses.

But we've seen prices go up, we've seen inflation go up.

We've seen that there's economic activity that hasn't happened because of these.

This is a tax on businesses, on American businesses and people.

And that always has economic friction and economic consequences.

And now let's cross to our Brussels correspondent, Rosie Burchard.

Rosie, Trump had said earlier that the Supreme Court decision meant that everyone in the rest of the world is dancing in the streets.

Well, there was certainly a sharp intake of breath in Brussels when this news broke out of the United States Supreme Court on Friday.

But I certainly haven't heard any champagne corks popping here or seen any dancing in the street, and

that's because it comes with a whole load of uncertainty.

The official European Commission position so far is that they are just analyzing this ruling and that they are trying to remain in touch with the US Administration to work out what the consequences of it might be.

When you talk to EU parliamentarians, they're a bit more outspoken.

They say that they see this as a kind of in principle as a good sign for the rule of law in the United States.

Remember, this past almost a year since the US first announced those so called reciprocal tariffs has been a pretty painful lesson for Europe and for the world in just how much power that presidential pen can hold in the United States.

And this court decision is seen as a first real check and balance on that.

Does this bring any more certainty for European businesses?

And in fact, in fact, amid that uncertainty, because we know Donald Trump is coming up already with a plan B, the first response you'll see from the European Union side in Brussels is that a plan to improve the next steps of ratification of a trade deal which the European Union signed with the United States last July to avoid the pain of even higher tariffs.