Trade groups urge a ‘more targeted’ Trump tariff policy

Washington DC, US – Donald Trump says his latest round of tariffs announced on 2 April will “supercharge” US industries. However, plastics and manufacturing groups had a more sceptical reaction, warning of disruption and higher costs.

“These new tariffs will disrupt supply chains, increase production costs and undermine our global competitiveness,” said Matt Seaholm, president and CEO of the Plastics Industry Association. Like some other business groups, it urged Trump to take a more surgical approach.

“Rather than imposing across-the-board tariffs that will harm American manufacturers and stifle growth, we encourage the administration to consider more targeted policies that take into account supply chains, promote investment, and maintain growth in US manufacturing,” Seaholm said in a statement.

In a White House speech, Trump announced across-the-board 10% tariffs on all countries and 25% tariffs on imported cars. Additionally, some countries will be subject to higher reciprocal tariffs based on Trump administration calculations of their tariff rates and other trade barriers. Goods from the EU would receive 20% tariffs, for example, while exports from China would receive an additional 34% tariff.

“For decades, our country has been looted, pillaged, raped and plundered by nations near and far, both friend and foe alike,” Trump claimed at the opening of a nearly hour-long address at the White House. “Foreign leaders have stolen our jobs. Foreign cheaters have ransacked our factories, and foreign scavengers have torn apart our once beautiful American Dream.”

Plastics and manufacturing groups urged the Trump administration to take a more strategic approach. Seaholm said the plastics group supports Trump’s goal of strengthening US business, but urged the administration to consider that the US plastics industry runs a trade surplus of about $1bn on exports of $74.2bn. “Our industry urges a thoughtful, strategic approach to trade and tariffs,” he said.

Similarly, the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) said in a statement that its companies were going to “brace for impact” from the tariffs, and also urged a more targeted approach from the Trump administration. Specifically, it wants Trump to minimise tariffs for manufacturers that are investing in the US, and give tariff-free access to critical inputs that factories use in their US manufacturing.

Industry seeks targeted strategy
NAM’s president and CEO Jay Timmons also said the administration should negotiate “zero-for-zero tariffs for American-made products in our trading partners’ markets. They don’t charge us, and we don’t charge them”.

Timmons said the new tariff regimen threatens US manufacturing investment and competitiveness. “Today’s announcement was complicated, and manufacturers are scrambling to determine the exact implications for their operations,” he said. “The stakes for manufacturers could not be higher.

“Many manufacturers in the US already operate with thin margins. The high costs of new tariffs threaten investment, jobs, supply chains and, in turn, America’s ability to outcompete other nations and lead as the pre-eminent manufacturing superpower.”

NAM urged the administration and Congress to make the 2017 tax cuts permanent, saying they helped factories and should be part of a manufacturing strategy with “a clear, strategic approach to trade”.

‘Complaints from globalists’
Trump, however, said his tariffs were needed to correct persistent trade deficits with other countries, and will lead to more manufacturing jobs in the US. At the White House briefing, Trump claimed the 20% tariffs on imports from the EU was based on administration calculations of an effective EU rate of 39% on US goods from tariffs and other trade barriers. For China, the administration calculated a 67% effective rate on US exports.

He said the US was setting its reciprocal tariffs at half the level faced by US goods, when also factoring in non-tariff barrier like currency manipulation. He said the reciprocal tariffs could have been set higher.

The executive order said the US lost 5 million factory jobs between 1997 and 2024. “In the coming days, there will be complaints from the globalists and the outsourcers and special interests and the fake news,” Trump said. “But don’t forget, every prediction our opponents made about trade for the last 30 years has been proven totally wrong. They were wrong about NAFTA. They were wrong about China.”

The US had a trade deficit in manufactured goods of about $1.2 trillion in 2024. Policy groups split on the meaning of those deficits, with the Cato Institute arguing concerns are misplaced and that the US remains a manufacturing powerhouse, while the Economic Policy Institute argues that botched trade policy has decimated US factory jobs.

Federal Reserve data said the US had 17.6 million manufacturing jobs at the end of 1997, compared with 12.7 million in December 2024, with analysts pointing to trade, automation and a shift to a more service-oriented economy.

Will tariffs sink auto sector?
Other manufacturing groups said the Trump tariffs would lead to economic harm. A group representing recycling companies echoed the plastics association and said the recycling sector has a trade surplus and that tariffs would disrupt US recycling operations. It said it feared the impact of retaliatory tariffs from other countries.

“The US recycled materials industry is a net exporter and supports nearly 600,000 jobs nationwide, with the exports of recyclables helping to reduce the US trade deficit,” said the Recycled Materials Association, formerly known as the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries.

"The imposition of new tariffs on our international trading partners will significantly disrupt US manufacturing and recycling operations that depend on recycled material inputs. US recyclers rely on international market access to support their workforce and these new tariffs, and any retaliatory measures they may provoke, will only reduce the competitiveness of our industry and the manufacturers that rely on recycled materials.”

The head of the Automotive Parts Manufacturers Association of Canada said, in a stylised post on the social media platform X, that the tariffs will “sink” the US auto sector. “The. Auto. Tariff. Package. Will. Shut. Down. The. Auto. Sector. In. The. USA. And. In. Canada,”  its president, Flavio Volpe, said. “Don't be distracted. Twenty-five percent tariffs are 4 times the [6% percent to 7% ] profit margins of all the companies.”

Volpe reposted an article from CTV News in Canada that said a Stellantis car plant in Windsor, Ontario, would shut down for two weeks starting on 7 April, with union officials telling the media outlet that the “primary driver” was the Trump administration’s latest tariff announcement.