Trump trains sights on “high-tariff” India
04 Mar 2019
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US President Donald Trump on Saturday alleged that continues to be a very high-tariff nation and that he is thinking of some kind of a reciprocal tax to lessen its impact on US goods and services.
“India is a very high-tariff nation. They charge us a lot,” Trump said in his address to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in the Maryland suburb of Washington DC.
Trump touched upon a range of issues, including domestic, global and bilateral relationship with countries like India, including his pet subject of India’s high tariffs on Harley-Davidson motorcycles.
“When we send a motorcycle to India, it’s a hundred per cent tariff. They charge 100 per cent when India sends a motorcycle to us, we brilliantly charge them nothing,” he mentioned during his speech that lasted for more than two hours.
“So, I want a reciprocal tax or at least, I want to charge a tax. It’s called the mirror tax, but it’s reciprocal,” Trump asserted.
It may be noted that at a White House event to announce his support for reciprocal tax, early this year, Trump had said he was satisfied with the Indian decision to reduce the import tariff on Harley-Davidson motorcycles from 100 per cent to 50 per cent. “Even this is not enough, this is okay,” he had said.
“Look at motorcycles as an example. (In) India, it was 100 per cent. I got them down to 50 per cent, just by talking for about two minutes. It’s still 50 per cent vs 2.4 per cent (on imported motorcycles to the US). Again, other than that, it’s a very fair deal,” the president had told reporters at the White House on January 24.
Trump was using the Indian example to highlight how other countries were imposing high taxes on American products and now it was time for the US to impose a reciprocal tax.
“But India is a very high-tariff nation. And they charge tremendously. So they charge a hundred. So I say, I’m not going to charge you a hundred, but I’m going to charge 25 per cent, and I hear this turmoil in the Senate because we are charging 25 per cent,” he said.
Trump told his supporters that there was resistance to his move from the Senate. “I say, fellows, listen, they are charging us a hundred per cent. For the exact same product, I want to charge them 25 per cent. I feel so foolish charging 25, because it should be a hundred. But I’m doing 25 only because of you. I want to get your support,” he said.
Thereafter, Trump mimicked the response from the lawmakers. “Sir, that’s not free trade. Where did these people come from? Where do they come from? I need your help, I need your help, the voters’ help. Where do they come from?,” he said.
Trump said the US could not allow a country to charge it 100 per cent while it got nothing for the exact same product.
“For one thing, they don’t respect us. They think we’re stupid. They don’t respect us. But let me tell you something, the world respects our country again,” he said.
“America is now booming like never before. Other countries are doing very poorly,” Trump said.
